Discussion Dates: Friday 27th November to Friday 11th December
1. What would you rate this book out of 10 and why?
Rachel: 10/10 This book was BEAUTIFUL. Possibly my best of 2015. It was moving, heart-breaking, thought-provoking, and beautifully structured. The fact that I set my alarm for 5.30 am on a Sunday morning so that I could finish the book in peace and solitude is testament to how much I loved this book! There is so much I would like to discuss with you all, I actually don't know where to start - Frederick (a sub-plot that continues to haunt me), the small contextual details that Doerr doesn't dwell on but that resonate loudly - the star sewn onto the Jewess' coat, the carriage of prisoners sleeping on their dead - the humanizing of the Nazi soldiers. Doerr expertly captures the losses on both sides of the war. He doesn't try to excuse or condone but he offers us a reality I think. Our murderers are would-be barbers, inventors, dreamers, boys who have been denied a childhood and forced along a path they wouldn't have otherwise taken. So many lives and so much potential on both sides just lain to waste.
Mel: 10/10. First book club book that I have given full marks too. I have felt for some time that I 'should' read this book as it won the Pulitzer and I had read reviews says how beautiful it was. However I had shied away from it for two reasons. One is that I find blindness hard to think about and confront and the idea of a story of a blind girl trying to stay alive in WWII was, I thought, too much for me to deal with. Also we have read a lot of WWII books in our book club and all of them have been excellent so I didn't think that this book could possibly stack up. I have just gone back through the books we have read and it seems that WWII books have consistently been my favs. All That I Am, Life After Life, The Narrow Road to the Deep North and even The Hare with Amber Eyes dealt a lot with WWII. And now All The Light We Cannot See. Each book has handled a different aspect of WWII and with each I have felt enriched with a new understanding of the horrors and complexities of war. This book I cannot fault. Two main characters (and a number of supporting characters) that I felt very deeply about, the plot was woven together tightly and the conclusion left me feeling hopeful yet it was not unrealistic. I desperately wanted them both to survive the war but of course they could not.
Sharyn (8/10) - Wow, I feel out of my depth coming after these two beautifully written and thoughtful reviews! I am afraid I was not as wowed by the book as you both. I enjoyed it and thought it was beautifully written but I was not in the right head space to fully appreciate it. It may be a sign of my laziness, but I did not like the fact that the author kept on changing between the present and future. This affected the 'flow' of the book for me. I would have much preferred it if it had been told in chronological order so I could have 'bonded' more with the characters. Having said that, it was interesting to read a book from the perspective of a blind character (I probably haven't done that since Heller Keller!) and from the perspective of a child in trainning to become a German officer.
Carissa 10./10. I, too, enjoyed this book more than any I have read for a long time - even The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Its construction kept me involved in all the characters throughout and it offered so much upon which to ponder and wonder. There was no foul language (what a relief after the Jamaican book - I can't remember its title) and no graphic sex scenes. The scenes of brutality were delivered without relish (again, in comparison with the Jamaican book). The characters were beautifully portrayed, both the likeable ones and others, and all were plausible. The threads that interwove characters were believable, too, even the link between von Rumpel and Marie Laure. This thread had a menace to it that held the reader's attention from the time we met him. The debate about the power of the Sea of Flames was realistic, too. Since time began, humans have been superstitious and still are.
Lucy: I am so sorry to be coming to the discussion late particularly since I have been looking forward to it. 9/10. I too loved this book. I knew nothing about it before hand but for some reason was ready to criticise it from the start - maybe also because we have read so many WWII books but very soon I realised I was not going to be able to view it negatively. Like you Sharyn, one of the things that annoyed me at first was the jumping from place to place and time to time, and like you I think it was laziness as it annoyed me to have to flick back to check what date something had happened and how old they would now be etc etc. But I do not think that the story would have worked nearly as well had it been written chronologically. We were kept under so much anticipation and worry about the characters because we knew some of what was going to happen. It starts with Marie Laure with her uncle so immediately you wonder what has happened to her father and you then spend the rest of the book hoping that her father will appear again - as you hope and fear for pretty much all of the characters. Ah, I've just seen that this is dealt with in the next question.
Lara: 10/10. I didn't think I would give a book a 10, but I honestly can't think of a book I've enjoyed more in Book Club (or otherwise) recently. I've already recommended it multiple times. I thought it was beautifully written and put a very different and interesting perspective on WWII. I too, was thinking to myself, "yet another WWII book?" but I there are so many facets of that conflict and so many stories to tell. I thought that while WWII is a key part of the book, many of its themes of course were universal. Also - did anyone else love Jutta? She had such a great spirit and intellectual curiosity - I hope my girls are similar to both her and Marie-Laure in terms of their strength and intellectual determination.
2. The narration moves back and forth both in time and between different characters. How did this affect your reading experience? How do you think the experience would have been different if the story had been told entirely in chronological order?
Rachel: I really enjoyed the structure of the book. I felt it weaved the plotlines together beautifully. Characters names would be mentioned in the present, Etienne for example, who you would have no connection to and gradually their significance unfolds as you flip back to the past. It also heightened the sense of inevitability, of all these lives careering uncontrollably towards a pre-determined fate. We as readers collude in this, we see where the characters' fates are heading and are powerless to stop it. Clever Doerr!
Sharyn: See my comments above.
Carissa: Had the story been told chronologically, it would have become two separate stories and the connections between the young German orphan and his experiences and the young, blind French girl and hers would have had to have been made in a clumsy way. I felt, like Mel, that the short chapters and jumping from date to date and person to person kept the reader interested in all the characters.
Lara: I actually liked that it was broken up as it increased the interest to me and I wanted to understand how the two paths of the main characters would collide eventually. It also felt more like someone recalling memories - often different timeframes, different fragments of a whole -- with connections interwoven.
3. Whose story did you enjoy the most? Was there any character you wanted more insight into?
Rachel: The story is well balanced between our two main characters. I connected equally with both Werner and Marie-Laure which sounds like a bland answer I know. As I mentioned above, the character of Frederick really spoke to me. Its not that I wanted more insight into him, I just so desperately wanted his tragic fate not to have happened. I wanted some beauty or light for him but I guess that was the point of the book - so many characters denied a 'happy ending'.
Mel: Normally when a book moves between two sub plots there is one that I am more engaged with and I hurry through the other to get back to my favourite. This was not the case with this book at all. Right from the start I felt totally engrossed and invested in the lives of both Werner and Marie-Laure. I think that the short chapters helped with this, you were never away from one character for more than a few pages.
Sharyn: I was more engaged in the sub-plot with Marie-Laure and her household because she was such a strong and resilient character who managed to find some lightness admid the darkness.
Carissa: I was equally engaged by both main characters, but even the less important characters, like Marie-Laure's father, Frau Elena, Jutta, Frederick, Volkheimer, Etienne and Madame Manec concerned me and held my attention. I should have liked to know more about Frau Elena's background, as well as Madame Manec's
Lucy: I also felt engaged with them all. All of them... Etienne and how we were slowly let into the horrors that he experienced and that shaped the way he was. Volkheimer and what was really going on in his head as he murdered endlessly and lost himself in music. Even the ladies who gave their small acts of resistance. It was all so believable and real.
Lara: Good question. I went to answer Marie-Laure, then realised how much I loved Werner's journey too. Again a sign of a great book. I think I'd have liked a bit more about Marie-Laure's father, Madame Manec, Frau Elena, and Volkheimer. I liked the way that they dealt with the German Nazification - like Werner, it made you feel uneasy, but you could at least understand how it could happen.
4. When Werner and Jutta first hear the Frenchman on the radio, he concludes his broadcast by saying “Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever” (pages 48–49), and Werner recalls these words throughout the book (pages 86, 264, and 409). How do you think this phrase relates to the overall message of the story? How does it relate to Madame Manec’s question: “Don’t you want to be alive before you die?” (page 270)?
Rachel: Doerr is keen to pitch Marie's physical blindness next to the metaphorical blindness of the German people. In acts of war and atrocities are bystanders as culpable as the perpetrators? Werner recognizes that Jutta saw and acknowledged what was going on long before he did. Werner saw but he turned his face away from reality. As we see with Werner, you do that so many times and then you become immune to reality, you close your eyes to what you are seeing. Similarly, Etienne tries to hide from the world, from reality, but by cutting himself off from the suffering of others, he too is not really living in the real sense of the world. Madame Manec is a character of action and is an important catalyst for Etienne's comeback.
Mel: I was interested in the way Doerr introduced us to a range of German characters. It is so easy for history to paint the German people as simply vulnerable due to poverty and lost hope to fascism, and certainly many many were. But we also meet Jutta (who I loved), who right from the start of the rise of the Nazi party could smell a rat and knew that what they were saying and doing was reprehensible. She was moral compass that Werner could keep turning back to even when he had not been in touch with her for long periods of time. In relation to the question I think that Jutta's eyes were open before she was even born - if that makes sense. And Fredrick, for whom refusing to participate it was not so much about a moral stand but more about his own gentle nature. There must have been thousands and thousands like Jutta and Fredrick, but there story has been lost inside a Germany engulfed by war. I would suggest that Fredrick for example was "alive before he died" (even though he lived) in the moment that he refused to participate in the training exercise that saw him nearly beaten to death. And obviously Werner did "live" by connecting with
Marie-Laure and looking after her and feeling a passion and tenderness towards her.
Sharyn: Sugh beautiful and insightful comments ladies. That phrase from
the book has stayed with me, although I interpreted them more simply as encouragement to seize the day and live life as fully as you can before you die. The juxtaposition between the characters who lived their lives as fully as they could in extraordinary circumstances and acTed in accordance with their moral compass in the face of adversity (Marie-Laure, her father, Madame Manec, Jutta) and those who didn't (Werner, Etienne) explored that issue.
Carissa: I can only echo Rachel's answer to this question. You have seen things exactly as I did. Madame Manec was expressing the same urgency, when losing patience with Etienne. He was hiding from the truth and from responsiblity for helping to alleviate suffering and counter injustice. The title of the book reflects the same tension between reality and the extent to which we perceive it - or dare to.
Lucy: When the children hear the line on the radio I also interpreted it as Sharyn has, encouraging them to question, explore and discover things. But I interpreted Madame Manec's question very differently. Her question was definitely a call to stand up for what you believe is right. To risk everything to stop what was going on. To get to the end of the war and either to be able to look back and believe you did something to help end it or to have died trying to do it. We are so lucky to have lived the lives we have lived and never to have experienced war and while reading this I often wondered how I would measure up. I would like to think that I would do something, but would I be able to do something that would potentially put my children at risk or would I, like the huge majority or Germans, French etc during WWII (and most of the world right now), put my head down and try to continue life as normally as possible? Alone in Berlin is another incredible book, based on a true story, about an ordinary couple's small act of defiance. It scares me to think about whether or not I would be able to do something.
Lara: Reading the above just made me thankful again to have you women as fellow readers/reviewers. I don't think I can say it much better. The whole book was a well crafted call to action on so many levels - intellectually, emotionally and physically. How are you going to react? How are you going to make the most of this life despite obvious obstacles. In every character you saw a humanity (even those who were less admirable - the jeweler for example) you could at least get a glimpse of how they got to where they were, their motives and another facet of their personality. That's real life; much more than straight up villains or heroes.
5. On page 368, Werner thinks, “That is how things are . . . with everybody in this unit, in this army, in this world, they do as they’re told, they get scared, they move about with only themselves in mind. Name me someone who does not.” But in fact many of the characters show great courage and selflessness throughout the story in some way, big or small. Talk about the different ways they put themselves at risk in order to do what they think is right. What do you think were some shining moments? Who did you admire most?
Rachel: Frederick's refusal to throw ice water at the half dead prisoner even in the knowledge of what would happen to him if he didn't. THE standout moment of the novel. He was only a child himself and yet he showed courage greater than any man.
Mel: I agree totally with what you say Rache abut Fredrick refusing to throw ice. It was a real stand out moment. I also admire the amazing soitically manner in which Marie-Laure and her Dad accepted her blindness and still found happiness and beauty in the world. Frau ? telling Jutta and the girls that she would be raped first by the Russian soldiers so that they would then "go easier" on them tore at my heart strings. Such selfless bravery and courage. It was how Frau ? lived her whole life.
Carissa: Frederick, certainly, and also the French Resistence people, including Marie-Laure and, finally, Etienne, who met in Madame Manec's kitchen and took terrible risks, Frau Elena's selfless care of the orphans, including the three girls, with whom she was caught by the Russian soldiers. In the end, Werner risked his life to rescue Marie Laure and Volkheimer, eventually, acted selflessly in ignoring Werner's discovery of the radio that should have been destroyed, along with the broadcasters - Etienne and Marie-Laure.
Lucy: I agree with all that has been said above. What also struck me was this. We felt for Werner, and in many ways liked him, because we knew what was going on in his mind. We know that he wanted to protect Frederick, we know that he didn't want to throw water on the prisoner, we know that he wished they did not have to kill the peasants using the radios and we know that he protected Marie Laure. Had we not known these things about him we would view him as a ruthless Nazi, just as we view all other ruthless Nazis. How many of the other boys in the training squad also did not want to throw water on the prisoner, how many others also did not want to catch the weakest boy and beat him up? We don't know but we judge them. While reading those passages about the race to catch the weakest boy who had had such a minor headstart I hated those other children. I could just stop myself from hating Werner, although I was screaming at him to do something, because I knew what he was thinking. It made me think a lot about how we never know and therefor so often misinterpret so many of the daily interactions we have because we can never truly understand what is going on inside the other person. It has made me stop and think about many of the ways I talk to and deal with my children and even my husband!! And it has made me think about how we judge others all the time.
6. On page 390, the author writes, “To shut your eyes is to guess nothing of blindness.” What did you learn or realize about blindness through Marie-Laure’s perspective? Do you think her being blind gave her any advantages?
Rachel: I worked for three years in a school for Visually Impaired children and so much of what we see of Marie's coping strategies are spot on. The counting of steps, the reliance on routine, the vulnerability and dependence on others, the heightened reliance on other senses. All of these things and yet not helpless and not a victim by any means. I am not going to say that being blind advantaged her because how could it, but being blind in no way deters her or defeats her in her acts of courage.
Mel: I found the exploration of blindness really interesting. As I said before I find the thought of blindness totally terrifying and so I was filled with amazement at how Marie-Laure refused to be defined by her blindness, and while it did make her more vulnerable her strength and courage and belief in the beauty of the world was so incredibly strong. I can't think of a female protagonist that I have admired more in a long long time.
Sharyn: The passages towards the end of the book where Marie-Laure is hiding in the closet and doesn't know whether someone was in the house really brought home to me how terrifying it would be to be blind in that situation.
Carissa: Marie-Laure's father gave us a good insight into how to compensate for blindness - the wooden models, with their secret catches, insisting that Marie-Laure count the steps to certain landmarks. Marie-Laure learned to use other senses in an alert way. I did not see any advantages to her blindness.
Lucy: For much of the novel you can almost forget that Marie Laure is blind and then you have times when you feel sick with worry for her because she can not see, and as you have all said how terrifying that can be. But what I found almost more unnerving, although I also hated the time she spent in the attic not knowing who was downstairs etc, was what she was not aware of as she did 'everyday' activities. Werner and Von Rumpel watch her and she has no idea that they are there and that I also find frightening.
Lara: I thought her father was extraordinary. of course he had a father's love, but he leveraged every skill he had to make her stronger and more independent than others her age and to make her believe that she could figure things out that seemed impossible. I wouldn't say it gave her an advantage as a whole, but her training in how to deal with her blindness made her amazingly strong and self-reliant and therefore better able to cope in the scariest of situations.
7. Why do you think Marie-Laure gave Werner the little iron key? Why might Werner have gone back for the wooden house but left the Sea of Flames?
Rachel: Yep, didn't get this one. Any thoughts anyone?
Mel: I wasn't really sure either. So that he had somewhere to hide?
Carissa: I pondered long and hard about this. She may not have wanted to be solely responsible for disposing the precious diamond, or Doerr may have been giving a chance for Werner to show his integrity by not stealing the diamond, Doerr may have used this incident to leave us unsure of what Werner did do with the diamond, since we know that he rescued the little house. Was it blown up with him?
Lucy: I thought is was so that he could possibly have somewhere to hide, or escape, or that he could use the diamond as a bargaining chip. It was also possibly a way for Doerr to show that in the end Werner was capable of doing what was right. I think he never took the diamond. The house could not have survived and the diamond been blown up.
Lara: I didn't know 100% either, but I think it was a sign of friendship and a place for him to take shelter. I loved that he went back and got the house, just as I loved how infatuated he was with her. I don't believe he took the diamond either -- plus, he would have lived if he had (right?!).
8. Von Rumpel seemed to believe in the power of the Sea of Flames, but was it truly a supernatural object or was it merely a gemstone at the center of coincidence? Do you think it brought any protection to Marie-Laure and/or bad luck to those she loved?
Rachel: If I'm honest, this is the only part of the story I found clumsy and a bit tedious. It was there for plot progression but I did find it all a bit blah blah! The gem was interesting simply because it astounds me to think of how much art and history can be lost and unfairly seized during war time.
Mel: I agree with Rachel, this section gripped me far less than the stories of Werner ad Marie-Laure. I guess the plot device was used to set Marie-Laure adrift from her father - something that I found incredibly sad.
Carissa: I think that Doerr introduced the theme to play on human tendency to believe in superstitions. We can argue that the diamond kept Marie-Laure safe, but brought great sadness to her dear ones - father, Madame Manec, Etienne, or we can see all their deaths as perfectly likely.
Lucy: I agree with Carissa. Particularly in times of such intensity humans allow themselves to believe in anything. And if we are told that something will curse us or protect us you have to be a strong character, particularly in times of such fear, not to attribute fate to the curse. Of course, as Carissa says, all their deaths and hardships are highly likely and no different to other families living through the same time but at the same time there would always be the temptation to wonder whether if the diamond hadn't existed would life have been different.
9. When Werner and Marie-Laure discuss the unknown fate of Captain Nemo at the end of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Marie-Laure suggests the open-endedness is intentional and meant to make us wonder (page 472). Are there any unanswered questions from this story that you think are meant to make us wonder?
Rachel: How you go from seeing what you have seen and committing acts of atrocities to a 'normal' life of fixing aerial connections. How you recover? How you forgive yourself? How you forgive your enemy when they have surrendered and you see they are mere children? How do you accept that you will never hear from or know what happened to a loved one as important as a parent or husband?
Carissa: I agree with Rachel's answer, but also the mystery of Marie-Laure's father's ending makes us wonder about so many who went missing and could not be traced after the war - and people who still do, like the 200 girls in Northern Nigeria.
Lucy: There are many unanswered questions and that is part of what makes the novel so good. Had Doerr answered all the questions and tied things up nicely it would not have been nearly as believable as it was.
Lara: I agree - I wanted things to be tied up, but life isn't so neat, and war certainly makes it even worse. I did like that Jutta at least had a little closure and that Werner's book came back to her, but the unknown bits made the whole story stronger and made the reader think harder.
10. The 1970s image of Jutta is one of a woman deeply guilt-ridden and self-conscious about her identity as a German. Why do you think she feels so much guilt over the crimes of others? Can you relate to this? Do you think she should feel any shame about her identity?
Rachel: Ummm, one word: British Empire. I will eternally hang my head in shame for the atrocities of my forefathers! In all seriousness, this was very thought-provoking. When you are guilty not in person but merely by identity. My lovely mother is staying with me at the moment and she was telling me how much of the Muslim community in my hometown are currently feeling nervous to walk the streets and self-conscious when out shopping even. Innocent and entirely separate from the actions of a certain few yet still blamed and judged simply because of their faith.
Mel: She shouldn't feel shame. But of course she does. The sense of national identity was so incredibly strong in the 20th Century. This is less so today, but I still feel a sense of shame as an Australian (even though I have not lived in Australia for 10 years) over the way successive Australian governments have been treating asylum seekers and Australia's appalling treatment of the indigenous people ever since colonization. I think very carefully about how I discuss the crimes of the Nazi's and the Japanese in WW2 with my classes, especially so when I have German and Japanese students in my class.
Carissa: Yes, I think it is natural to feel shame, if you know you are perceived as part of a group or society, who have caused untold suffering. The sad, but inevitable reason for Jutta's feelings is that she was intelligent, perceptive and sensitive enough to see when the Nazi atrocities began to affect society, when she was a child.
11. What do you think of the author’s decision to flash forward at the end of the book? Did you like getting a peek into the future of some of these characters? Did anything surprise you?
Mel: Yes I did like the peek into the future. Probably because I was so invested in the characters, and loved and respected both Jutta and Marie-Laure so much that I found it satisfying to have them brought together. Unrealistic? Probably. But satisfying nonetheless.
Carissa: I liked a glimpse into the future and I liked knowing that Marie-Laure and Jutta survived and met. I was interested to discover what had happened to Volkheimer. I do not remember being surprised by anything suggested about the future.
Lara: I think it had the potential to go wrong, but in the end I'm glad that I did. I was hungry to know and thankful for the glimpse. I was so pleased that Marie-Laure had a daughter and a grandson and although she hadn't stayed with her partner, she was as fulfilled as she could be (although it made me sad to think that she could have been with Werner). Volkheimer was also very interesting to me in terms of his loneliness, how he played with Jutta's boy, etc. In some ways I thought Jutta would be doing something more extraordinary, but she was with a good man, bringing up a another curious boy and living her life as best she could. The war changed her of course, but she continued with her love of learning.
12. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once wrote that “the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.” All the Light We Cannot See is filled with examples of human nature at its best and worst. Discuss the themes of good versus evil throughout the story. How do they drive each other? What do you think are the ultimate lessons that these characters and the resolution of their stories teach us?
Rachel: Conrad is at the centre of every good piece of literature - it is the heart of darkness in us all. Given the right context, the right situation, who knows how any of us would act. We all exist in shades of grey, no one is inherently evil or inherently good.
Mel: I agree. One of my favourite saying (and one that I often say to Ben who mostly lives in a world of black and white) that 'no one is the sum of just one part'. Werner of course is the best example of this. We know him before the war, we understands why and how he ticks and we forgive (at least I did) his role in the mechanism of the Nazi party as having been born in the wrong place at the wrong time and simply a product of his circumstances - without the ability to make choices for himself.
Carissa: I think that the themes and characters do give us an optimistic sign that good prevails in the end. Volkheimer stops killing and helps to resuce, Etienne stops letting evil continue and helps the resistance, von Rumpel's evil and destructive plan is foiled by Werner - ironically, the first time Werner attacks anybody.
Lucy: Please see my answer to 5.
13. Is there anything else that you would like to ask or to add about “All the Light We Cannot See”?
Rachel: Had a chuckle at the reality of living under the restrictions of occupation - as one woman complained, not another night of staying at home alone with the husband!! The small details that give this book such heart!
Lucy: The review did not make me change my mind about the book but has made me think about the author of the review. I wonder what he is doing about the atrocities happening around the world right now or whether he is normalising them by pottering down to his local coffee shop, opening up his lap top and writing his review.
Lara: I just think he comes off as a bit of an arse actually - an intelligent, but very smug one. I don't feel the book was sentimental or twee, but I'll at least give him that he raises a few interesting points. I certainly don't think it "normalised" Nazism and I didn't feel like it went to such stereotypes either.
Finally - I really want to go to Saint Malo now and am working on when I can bring the family there sometime. It looks absolutely stunning online.
1. What would you rate this book out of 10 and why?
Rachel: 10/10 This book was BEAUTIFUL. Possibly my best of 2015. It was moving, heart-breaking, thought-provoking, and beautifully structured. The fact that I set my alarm for 5.30 am on a Sunday morning so that I could finish the book in peace and solitude is testament to how much I loved this book! There is so much I would like to discuss with you all, I actually don't know where to start - Frederick (a sub-plot that continues to haunt me), the small contextual details that Doerr doesn't dwell on but that resonate loudly - the star sewn onto the Jewess' coat, the carriage of prisoners sleeping on their dead - the humanizing of the Nazi soldiers. Doerr expertly captures the losses on both sides of the war. He doesn't try to excuse or condone but he offers us a reality I think. Our murderers are would-be barbers, inventors, dreamers, boys who have been denied a childhood and forced along a path they wouldn't have otherwise taken. So many lives and so much potential on both sides just lain to waste.
Mel: 10/10. First book club book that I have given full marks too. I have felt for some time that I 'should' read this book as it won the Pulitzer and I had read reviews says how beautiful it was. However I had shied away from it for two reasons. One is that I find blindness hard to think about and confront and the idea of a story of a blind girl trying to stay alive in WWII was, I thought, too much for me to deal with. Also we have read a lot of WWII books in our book club and all of them have been excellent so I didn't think that this book could possibly stack up. I have just gone back through the books we have read and it seems that WWII books have consistently been my favs. All That I Am, Life After Life, The Narrow Road to the Deep North and even The Hare with Amber Eyes dealt a lot with WWII. And now All The Light We Cannot See. Each book has handled a different aspect of WWII and with each I have felt enriched with a new understanding of the horrors and complexities of war. This book I cannot fault. Two main characters (and a number of supporting characters) that I felt very deeply about, the plot was woven together tightly and the conclusion left me feeling hopeful yet it was not unrealistic. I desperately wanted them both to survive the war but of course they could not.
Sharyn (8/10) - Wow, I feel out of my depth coming after these two beautifully written and thoughtful reviews! I am afraid I was not as wowed by the book as you both. I enjoyed it and thought it was beautifully written but I was not in the right head space to fully appreciate it. It may be a sign of my laziness, but I did not like the fact that the author kept on changing between the present and future. This affected the 'flow' of the book for me. I would have much preferred it if it had been told in chronological order so I could have 'bonded' more with the characters. Having said that, it was interesting to read a book from the perspective of a blind character (I probably haven't done that since Heller Keller!) and from the perspective of a child in trainning to become a German officer.
Carissa 10./10. I, too, enjoyed this book more than any I have read for a long time - even The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Its construction kept me involved in all the characters throughout and it offered so much upon which to ponder and wonder. There was no foul language (what a relief after the Jamaican book - I can't remember its title) and no graphic sex scenes. The scenes of brutality were delivered without relish (again, in comparison with the Jamaican book). The characters were beautifully portrayed, both the likeable ones and others, and all were plausible. The threads that interwove characters were believable, too, even the link between von Rumpel and Marie Laure. This thread had a menace to it that held the reader's attention from the time we met him. The debate about the power of the Sea of Flames was realistic, too. Since time began, humans have been superstitious and still are.
Lucy: I am so sorry to be coming to the discussion late particularly since I have been looking forward to it. 9/10. I too loved this book. I knew nothing about it before hand but for some reason was ready to criticise it from the start - maybe also because we have read so many WWII books but very soon I realised I was not going to be able to view it negatively. Like you Sharyn, one of the things that annoyed me at first was the jumping from place to place and time to time, and like you I think it was laziness as it annoyed me to have to flick back to check what date something had happened and how old they would now be etc etc. But I do not think that the story would have worked nearly as well had it been written chronologically. We were kept under so much anticipation and worry about the characters because we knew some of what was going to happen. It starts with Marie Laure with her uncle so immediately you wonder what has happened to her father and you then spend the rest of the book hoping that her father will appear again - as you hope and fear for pretty much all of the characters. Ah, I've just seen that this is dealt with in the next question.
Lara: 10/10. I didn't think I would give a book a 10, but I honestly can't think of a book I've enjoyed more in Book Club (or otherwise) recently. I've already recommended it multiple times. I thought it was beautifully written and put a very different and interesting perspective on WWII. I too, was thinking to myself, "yet another WWII book?" but I there are so many facets of that conflict and so many stories to tell. I thought that while WWII is a key part of the book, many of its themes of course were universal. Also - did anyone else love Jutta? She had such a great spirit and intellectual curiosity - I hope my girls are similar to both her and Marie-Laure in terms of their strength and intellectual determination.
2. The narration moves back and forth both in time and between different characters. How did this affect your reading experience? How do you think the experience would have been different if the story had been told entirely in chronological order?
Rachel: I really enjoyed the structure of the book. I felt it weaved the plotlines together beautifully. Characters names would be mentioned in the present, Etienne for example, who you would have no connection to and gradually their significance unfolds as you flip back to the past. It also heightened the sense of inevitability, of all these lives careering uncontrollably towards a pre-determined fate. We as readers collude in this, we see where the characters' fates are heading and are powerless to stop it. Clever Doerr!
Sharyn: See my comments above.
Carissa: Had the story been told chronologically, it would have become two separate stories and the connections between the young German orphan and his experiences and the young, blind French girl and hers would have had to have been made in a clumsy way. I felt, like Mel, that the short chapters and jumping from date to date and person to person kept the reader interested in all the characters.
Lara: I actually liked that it was broken up as it increased the interest to me and I wanted to understand how the two paths of the main characters would collide eventually. It also felt more like someone recalling memories - often different timeframes, different fragments of a whole -- with connections interwoven.
3. Whose story did you enjoy the most? Was there any character you wanted more insight into?
Rachel: The story is well balanced between our two main characters. I connected equally with both Werner and Marie-Laure which sounds like a bland answer I know. As I mentioned above, the character of Frederick really spoke to me. Its not that I wanted more insight into him, I just so desperately wanted his tragic fate not to have happened. I wanted some beauty or light for him but I guess that was the point of the book - so many characters denied a 'happy ending'.
Mel: Normally when a book moves between two sub plots there is one that I am more engaged with and I hurry through the other to get back to my favourite. This was not the case with this book at all. Right from the start I felt totally engrossed and invested in the lives of both Werner and Marie-Laure. I think that the short chapters helped with this, you were never away from one character for more than a few pages.
Sharyn: I was more engaged in the sub-plot with Marie-Laure and her household because she was such a strong and resilient character who managed to find some lightness admid the darkness.
Carissa: I was equally engaged by both main characters, but even the less important characters, like Marie-Laure's father, Frau Elena, Jutta, Frederick, Volkheimer, Etienne and Madame Manec concerned me and held my attention. I should have liked to know more about Frau Elena's background, as well as Madame Manec's
Lucy: I also felt engaged with them all. All of them... Etienne and how we were slowly let into the horrors that he experienced and that shaped the way he was. Volkheimer and what was really going on in his head as he murdered endlessly and lost himself in music. Even the ladies who gave their small acts of resistance. It was all so believable and real.
Lara: Good question. I went to answer Marie-Laure, then realised how much I loved Werner's journey too. Again a sign of a great book. I think I'd have liked a bit more about Marie-Laure's father, Madame Manec, Frau Elena, and Volkheimer. I liked the way that they dealt with the German Nazification - like Werner, it made you feel uneasy, but you could at least understand how it could happen.
4. When Werner and Jutta first hear the Frenchman on the radio, he concludes his broadcast by saying “Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever” (pages 48–49), and Werner recalls these words throughout the book (pages 86, 264, and 409). How do you think this phrase relates to the overall message of the story? How does it relate to Madame Manec’s question: “Don’t you want to be alive before you die?” (page 270)?
Rachel: Doerr is keen to pitch Marie's physical blindness next to the metaphorical blindness of the German people. In acts of war and atrocities are bystanders as culpable as the perpetrators? Werner recognizes that Jutta saw and acknowledged what was going on long before he did. Werner saw but he turned his face away from reality. As we see with Werner, you do that so many times and then you become immune to reality, you close your eyes to what you are seeing. Similarly, Etienne tries to hide from the world, from reality, but by cutting himself off from the suffering of others, he too is not really living in the real sense of the world. Madame Manec is a character of action and is an important catalyst for Etienne's comeback.
Mel: I was interested in the way Doerr introduced us to a range of German characters. It is so easy for history to paint the German people as simply vulnerable due to poverty and lost hope to fascism, and certainly many many were. But we also meet Jutta (who I loved), who right from the start of the rise of the Nazi party could smell a rat and knew that what they were saying and doing was reprehensible. She was moral compass that Werner could keep turning back to even when he had not been in touch with her for long periods of time. In relation to the question I think that Jutta's eyes were open before she was even born - if that makes sense. And Fredrick, for whom refusing to participate it was not so much about a moral stand but more about his own gentle nature. There must have been thousands and thousands like Jutta and Fredrick, but there story has been lost inside a Germany engulfed by war. I would suggest that Fredrick for example was "alive before he died" (even though he lived) in the moment that he refused to participate in the training exercise that saw him nearly beaten to death. And obviously Werner did "live" by connecting with
Marie-Laure and looking after her and feeling a passion and tenderness towards her.
Sharyn: Sugh beautiful and insightful comments ladies. That phrase from
the book has stayed with me, although I interpreted them more simply as encouragement to seize the day and live life as fully as you can before you die. The juxtaposition between the characters who lived their lives as fully as they could in extraordinary circumstances and acTed in accordance with their moral compass in the face of adversity (Marie-Laure, her father, Madame Manec, Jutta) and those who didn't (Werner, Etienne) explored that issue.
Carissa: I can only echo Rachel's answer to this question. You have seen things exactly as I did. Madame Manec was expressing the same urgency, when losing patience with Etienne. He was hiding from the truth and from responsiblity for helping to alleviate suffering and counter injustice. The title of the book reflects the same tension between reality and the extent to which we perceive it - or dare to.
Lucy: When the children hear the line on the radio I also interpreted it as Sharyn has, encouraging them to question, explore and discover things. But I interpreted Madame Manec's question very differently. Her question was definitely a call to stand up for what you believe is right. To risk everything to stop what was going on. To get to the end of the war and either to be able to look back and believe you did something to help end it or to have died trying to do it. We are so lucky to have lived the lives we have lived and never to have experienced war and while reading this I often wondered how I would measure up. I would like to think that I would do something, but would I be able to do something that would potentially put my children at risk or would I, like the huge majority or Germans, French etc during WWII (and most of the world right now), put my head down and try to continue life as normally as possible? Alone in Berlin is another incredible book, based on a true story, about an ordinary couple's small act of defiance. It scares me to think about whether or not I would be able to do something.
Lara: Reading the above just made me thankful again to have you women as fellow readers/reviewers. I don't think I can say it much better. The whole book was a well crafted call to action on so many levels - intellectually, emotionally and physically. How are you going to react? How are you going to make the most of this life despite obvious obstacles. In every character you saw a humanity (even those who were less admirable - the jeweler for example) you could at least get a glimpse of how they got to where they were, their motives and another facet of their personality. That's real life; much more than straight up villains or heroes.
5. On page 368, Werner thinks, “That is how things are . . . with everybody in this unit, in this army, in this world, they do as they’re told, they get scared, they move about with only themselves in mind. Name me someone who does not.” But in fact many of the characters show great courage and selflessness throughout the story in some way, big or small. Talk about the different ways they put themselves at risk in order to do what they think is right. What do you think were some shining moments? Who did you admire most?
Rachel: Frederick's refusal to throw ice water at the half dead prisoner even in the knowledge of what would happen to him if he didn't. THE standout moment of the novel. He was only a child himself and yet he showed courage greater than any man.
Mel: I agree totally with what you say Rache abut Fredrick refusing to throw ice. It was a real stand out moment. I also admire the amazing soitically manner in which Marie-Laure and her Dad accepted her blindness and still found happiness and beauty in the world. Frau ? telling Jutta and the girls that she would be raped first by the Russian soldiers so that they would then "go easier" on them tore at my heart strings. Such selfless bravery and courage. It was how Frau ? lived her whole life.
Carissa: Frederick, certainly, and also the French Resistence people, including Marie-Laure and, finally, Etienne, who met in Madame Manec's kitchen and took terrible risks, Frau Elena's selfless care of the orphans, including the three girls, with whom she was caught by the Russian soldiers. In the end, Werner risked his life to rescue Marie Laure and Volkheimer, eventually, acted selflessly in ignoring Werner's discovery of the radio that should have been destroyed, along with the broadcasters - Etienne and Marie-Laure.
Lucy: I agree with all that has been said above. What also struck me was this. We felt for Werner, and in many ways liked him, because we knew what was going on in his mind. We know that he wanted to protect Frederick, we know that he didn't want to throw water on the prisoner, we know that he wished they did not have to kill the peasants using the radios and we know that he protected Marie Laure. Had we not known these things about him we would view him as a ruthless Nazi, just as we view all other ruthless Nazis. How many of the other boys in the training squad also did not want to throw water on the prisoner, how many others also did not want to catch the weakest boy and beat him up? We don't know but we judge them. While reading those passages about the race to catch the weakest boy who had had such a minor headstart I hated those other children. I could just stop myself from hating Werner, although I was screaming at him to do something, because I knew what he was thinking. It made me think a lot about how we never know and therefor so often misinterpret so many of the daily interactions we have because we can never truly understand what is going on inside the other person. It has made me stop and think about many of the ways I talk to and deal with my children and even my husband!! And it has made me think about how we judge others all the time.
6. On page 390, the author writes, “To shut your eyes is to guess nothing of blindness.” What did you learn or realize about blindness through Marie-Laure’s perspective? Do you think her being blind gave her any advantages?
Rachel: I worked for three years in a school for Visually Impaired children and so much of what we see of Marie's coping strategies are spot on. The counting of steps, the reliance on routine, the vulnerability and dependence on others, the heightened reliance on other senses. All of these things and yet not helpless and not a victim by any means. I am not going to say that being blind advantaged her because how could it, but being blind in no way deters her or defeats her in her acts of courage.
Mel: I found the exploration of blindness really interesting. As I said before I find the thought of blindness totally terrifying and so I was filled with amazement at how Marie-Laure refused to be defined by her blindness, and while it did make her more vulnerable her strength and courage and belief in the beauty of the world was so incredibly strong. I can't think of a female protagonist that I have admired more in a long long time.
Sharyn: The passages towards the end of the book where Marie-Laure is hiding in the closet and doesn't know whether someone was in the house really brought home to me how terrifying it would be to be blind in that situation.
Carissa: Marie-Laure's father gave us a good insight into how to compensate for blindness - the wooden models, with their secret catches, insisting that Marie-Laure count the steps to certain landmarks. Marie-Laure learned to use other senses in an alert way. I did not see any advantages to her blindness.
Lucy: For much of the novel you can almost forget that Marie Laure is blind and then you have times when you feel sick with worry for her because she can not see, and as you have all said how terrifying that can be. But what I found almost more unnerving, although I also hated the time she spent in the attic not knowing who was downstairs etc, was what she was not aware of as she did 'everyday' activities. Werner and Von Rumpel watch her and she has no idea that they are there and that I also find frightening.
Lara: I thought her father was extraordinary. of course he had a father's love, but he leveraged every skill he had to make her stronger and more independent than others her age and to make her believe that she could figure things out that seemed impossible. I wouldn't say it gave her an advantage as a whole, but her training in how to deal with her blindness made her amazingly strong and self-reliant and therefore better able to cope in the scariest of situations.
7. Why do you think Marie-Laure gave Werner the little iron key? Why might Werner have gone back for the wooden house but left the Sea of Flames?
Rachel: Yep, didn't get this one. Any thoughts anyone?
Mel: I wasn't really sure either. So that he had somewhere to hide?
Carissa: I pondered long and hard about this. She may not have wanted to be solely responsible for disposing the precious diamond, or Doerr may have been giving a chance for Werner to show his integrity by not stealing the diamond, Doerr may have used this incident to leave us unsure of what Werner did do with the diamond, since we know that he rescued the little house. Was it blown up with him?
Lucy: I thought is was so that he could possibly have somewhere to hide, or escape, or that he could use the diamond as a bargaining chip. It was also possibly a way for Doerr to show that in the end Werner was capable of doing what was right. I think he never took the diamond. The house could not have survived and the diamond been blown up.
Lara: I didn't know 100% either, but I think it was a sign of friendship and a place for him to take shelter. I loved that he went back and got the house, just as I loved how infatuated he was with her. I don't believe he took the diamond either -- plus, he would have lived if he had (right?!).
8. Von Rumpel seemed to believe in the power of the Sea of Flames, but was it truly a supernatural object or was it merely a gemstone at the center of coincidence? Do you think it brought any protection to Marie-Laure and/or bad luck to those she loved?
Rachel: If I'm honest, this is the only part of the story I found clumsy and a bit tedious. It was there for plot progression but I did find it all a bit blah blah! The gem was interesting simply because it astounds me to think of how much art and history can be lost and unfairly seized during war time.
Mel: I agree with Rachel, this section gripped me far less than the stories of Werner ad Marie-Laure. I guess the plot device was used to set Marie-Laure adrift from her father - something that I found incredibly sad.
Carissa: I think that Doerr introduced the theme to play on human tendency to believe in superstitions. We can argue that the diamond kept Marie-Laure safe, but brought great sadness to her dear ones - father, Madame Manec, Etienne, or we can see all their deaths as perfectly likely.
Lucy: I agree with Carissa. Particularly in times of such intensity humans allow themselves to believe in anything. And if we are told that something will curse us or protect us you have to be a strong character, particularly in times of such fear, not to attribute fate to the curse. Of course, as Carissa says, all their deaths and hardships are highly likely and no different to other families living through the same time but at the same time there would always be the temptation to wonder whether if the diamond hadn't existed would life have been different.
9. When Werner and Marie-Laure discuss the unknown fate of Captain Nemo at the end of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Marie-Laure suggests the open-endedness is intentional and meant to make us wonder (page 472). Are there any unanswered questions from this story that you think are meant to make us wonder?
Rachel: How you go from seeing what you have seen and committing acts of atrocities to a 'normal' life of fixing aerial connections. How you recover? How you forgive yourself? How you forgive your enemy when they have surrendered and you see they are mere children? How do you accept that you will never hear from or know what happened to a loved one as important as a parent or husband?
Carissa: I agree with Rachel's answer, but also the mystery of Marie-Laure's father's ending makes us wonder about so many who went missing and could not be traced after the war - and people who still do, like the 200 girls in Northern Nigeria.
Lucy: There are many unanswered questions and that is part of what makes the novel so good. Had Doerr answered all the questions and tied things up nicely it would not have been nearly as believable as it was.
Lara: I agree - I wanted things to be tied up, but life isn't so neat, and war certainly makes it even worse. I did like that Jutta at least had a little closure and that Werner's book came back to her, but the unknown bits made the whole story stronger and made the reader think harder.
10. The 1970s image of Jutta is one of a woman deeply guilt-ridden and self-conscious about her identity as a German. Why do you think she feels so much guilt over the crimes of others? Can you relate to this? Do you think she should feel any shame about her identity?
Rachel: Ummm, one word: British Empire. I will eternally hang my head in shame for the atrocities of my forefathers! In all seriousness, this was very thought-provoking. When you are guilty not in person but merely by identity. My lovely mother is staying with me at the moment and she was telling me how much of the Muslim community in my hometown are currently feeling nervous to walk the streets and self-conscious when out shopping even. Innocent and entirely separate from the actions of a certain few yet still blamed and judged simply because of their faith.
Mel: She shouldn't feel shame. But of course she does. The sense of national identity was so incredibly strong in the 20th Century. This is less so today, but I still feel a sense of shame as an Australian (even though I have not lived in Australia for 10 years) over the way successive Australian governments have been treating asylum seekers and Australia's appalling treatment of the indigenous people ever since colonization. I think very carefully about how I discuss the crimes of the Nazi's and the Japanese in WW2 with my classes, especially so when I have German and Japanese students in my class.
Carissa: Yes, I think it is natural to feel shame, if you know you are perceived as part of a group or society, who have caused untold suffering. The sad, but inevitable reason for Jutta's feelings is that she was intelligent, perceptive and sensitive enough to see when the Nazi atrocities began to affect society, when she was a child.
11. What do you think of the author’s decision to flash forward at the end of the book? Did you like getting a peek into the future of some of these characters? Did anything surprise you?
Mel: Yes I did like the peek into the future. Probably because I was so invested in the characters, and loved and respected both Jutta and Marie-Laure so much that I found it satisfying to have them brought together. Unrealistic? Probably. But satisfying nonetheless.
Carissa: I liked a glimpse into the future and I liked knowing that Marie-Laure and Jutta survived and met. I was interested to discover what had happened to Volkheimer. I do not remember being surprised by anything suggested about the future.
Lara: I think it had the potential to go wrong, but in the end I'm glad that I did. I was hungry to know and thankful for the glimpse. I was so pleased that Marie-Laure had a daughter and a grandson and although she hadn't stayed with her partner, she was as fulfilled as she could be (although it made me sad to think that she could have been with Werner). Volkheimer was also very interesting to me in terms of his loneliness, how he played with Jutta's boy, etc. In some ways I thought Jutta would be doing something more extraordinary, but she was with a good man, bringing up a another curious boy and living her life as best she could. The war changed her of course, but she continued with her love of learning.
12. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once wrote that “the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.” All the Light We Cannot See is filled with examples of human nature at its best and worst. Discuss the themes of good versus evil throughout the story. How do they drive each other? What do you think are the ultimate lessons that these characters and the resolution of their stories teach us?
Rachel: Conrad is at the centre of every good piece of literature - it is the heart of darkness in us all. Given the right context, the right situation, who knows how any of us would act. We all exist in shades of grey, no one is inherently evil or inherently good.
Mel: I agree. One of my favourite saying (and one that I often say to Ben who mostly lives in a world of black and white) that 'no one is the sum of just one part'. Werner of course is the best example of this. We know him before the war, we understands why and how he ticks and we forgive (at least I did) his role in the mechanism of the Nazi party as having been born in the wrong place at the wrong time and simply a product of his circumstances - without the ability to make choices for himself.
Carissa: I think that the themes and characters do give us an optimistic sign that good prevails in the end. Volkheimer stops killing and helps to resuce, Etienne stops letting evil continue and helps the resistance, von Rumpel's evil and destructive plan is foiled by Werner - ironically, the first time Werner attacks anybody.
Lucy: Please see my answer to 5.
13. Is there anything else that you would like to ask or to add about “All the Light We Cannot See”?
Rachel: Had a chuckle at the reality of living under the restrictions of occupation - as one woman complained, not another night of staying at home alone with the husband!! The small details that give this book such heart!
Mel: I laughed at that line too Rache.
I read this very mean spirited review of the book
https://newrepublic.com/article/120769/problem-anthony-doerrs-all-light-we-cannot-see
How do you feel when you read a bad review of a book/movie/play that you have loved? Does this review change your opinion of the book at all?
Lucy: The review did not make me change my mind about the book but has made me think about the author of the review. I wonder what he is doing about the atrocities happening around the world right now or whether he is normalising them by pottering down to his local coffee shop, opening up his lap top and writing his review.
Lara:
I just think he comes off as a bit of an arse actually - an intelligent, but very smug one. I don't feel the book was sentimental or twee, but I'll at least give him that he raises a few interesting points. I certainly don't think it "normalised" Nazism and I didn't feel like it went to such stereotypes either.
Finally - I really want to go to Saint Malo now and am working on when I can bring the family there sometime. It looks absolutely stunning online.
https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/media/12480/an-aerial-view-of-st-malo-in-the-distance/tourismcarousel/an-aerial-view-of-st-malo-in-the-distance.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/guides/france/brittany/st-malo&h=460&w=530&tbnid=O-Fy78Sb0S5duM:&tbnh=160&tbnw=184&docid=8C-3DMvVOMK1NM&itg=1&usg=__kK-6Zvl17j5N7tdnW0Y2_avvWuo=